


terrible things

by the__pigeon



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Intrusive Thoughts, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Suicidal Thoughts, Whoops Its All Projection, eret uses all pronouns, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:40:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28171047
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the__pigeon/pseuds/the__pigeon
Summary: I don't want to think about my past life, Technoblade.Don't think about your past, Tommy.Ohh, I'm thinking about my past, thinking about all the fucked up things I thought about.I thought about some terrible things, Technoblade.Tommy's mental state has been gradually decaying for the longest time.(based off a conversations techno and tommy had in the 19/12/2020 stream (or 12/19/20 if ur american))
Relationships: Dave | Technoblade & TommyInnit
Comments: 6
Kudos: 320





	terrible things

**Author's Note:**

> does it count as projection if the character already has all your problems anyway?
> 
> also i never know whether or not to tag major character death here because like. they die. but they still have three lives n stuff? idk
> 
> also also i just wanted to say that what im portraying here is not 'hearing voices' or anything, it's mostly based off my own experiences with intrusive thoughts
> 
> also also also i wrote this in like two hours and i feel like parts of it are incomprehensible

Tommy lost his first life in The Final Control Room, when Eret betrayed L’Manberg.

He was mad. Understandably so. One of the people that had been his ally for so long had just turned on them, not only destroying so many of their hopes for winning, not only weakening the bonds among the team, not only sewing doubt throughout the remaining ranks, but was responsible for so many deaths.

So the next time they fought, the group fought harder.

The next time Tommy saw Eret, he was terrified, but he was also ecstatic. All the rage, hatred, anger that had bubbled under his skin for weeks could finally be let out as he attacked and screamed and yelled.

_Kill them._

He didn’t kill her. He didn’t even come close. But the entire battle, it was just a continuous train of thought in the back of his mind. Kill, stab, shank, bite, hit, attack, anything and everything gruesome. Anything to get back at him for what they did. For the pain caused.

He has a very vivid memory of something he thought of while fighting her.

_Take a piece of string and wrap it around his neck. Hold it there. Pull it tight enough to bleed. Hold it long enough to make her collapse. Kick him while they’re done._

He came very close to dissembling his bow in that fight, but he didn’t.

That night, he couldn’t sleep. Just thought of Eret, small droplets of blood running down his neck as they fall to the floor.

Tommy tried to ignore it.

_Grab Schlatt’s horns and rip them out. He hurt Tubbo. It’s what he deserves._

The thoughts, he told himself, would fade with time. He’s perfectly fine. This is probably just a side effect of being so awesome at PVP.

_Push Wilbur off the railing so he falls to the bottom of the ravine. Maybe a hit to the head will turn him back to who he used to be._

He decides, just to be careful, to always go in front of Wilbur when they walk down the stairs in Pogtopia, and he does not turn around to look at his brother. See, everything is fine?

_Sapnap killed Henry. I should suffocate Mars. Suffocate Sapnap._

It’s not meant to bother him so much. He’s Tommy, what does it matter? He’s said worse things out loud about a range of things—this is stuff he’s witnessed in his life. He’s seen death before. He's died before.

So why does thinking about it bother him?

When ignoring doesn’t work, he starts enacting them.

_Fight Techno. Punch his teeth out. Shatter his crown. He killed Tubbo. Kill him back._

Then comes the pit. Techno kills Tubbo. Tommy wants to kill him back, so they fight.

_Stab him, slap him, punch him, kill him-_

His thoughts overtook his mind. He was much too easily defeated for someone who thought of nothing but bloodlust.

The bloodshed, the fighting, the pain, it doesn’t make him feel better. It makes him feel worse. He feels sick to his stomach when he looks in the pit and sees his dried blood against the wall, against the floor, against the ceiling. Surely, he thinks, the dissatisfaction he feels is enough to make the thoughts stop.

_I did what you asked me to. Now stop asking more of me._

The thoughts return, tenfold.

The Revolutions comes and goes.

One brother is dead. One has rebelled. Both betrayed him.

_Hurt them back._

Tommy pushes through.

His dad is here. Phil makes sure Tommy is okay. He remembers his father asking him at one point if there’s anything wrong, anything unusual.

“From what I’ve heard, life hasn’t been kind to you in my absence,” he had said.

“Life’s a bitch,” Tommy said, with confidence. “I am above it.”

Phil seemed unsure, but he doesn’t ask again. He’s constantly in the background, however, constantly seeing him, giving him vague offers of support. He appears to be worried about Tommy.

_Tell him to back off. Tell him he’s a bitch. Tell him I don’t need help, I don’t want it. I don’t want his stupid pity._

It’s not a violent thought, but it somehow stings as if it is.

The plan to rob and grief George’s house was not one of Tommy’s thoughts. It was something he came up with, on his own volition. And Ranboo, though a somewhat comforting presence in the grand scheme of things, is a pushover.

Tommy asked him to join him.

Ranboo agreed.

Watching George’s house go up in flames makes the thoughts quiet down. They’re not as loud. Despite that, there’s one that persists.

_Blame Ranboo._

Which is, frankly, a weird thought. Because while Ranboo did technically do it, he was more of an accomplice than anything else. The blame is all Tommy’s.

But the trial comes, and he has the perfect opportunity to blame Ranboo.

He doesn’t.

He rebels against the thoughts.

It doesn't make him feel better.

It just places him in the back of a boat, Dream at the front, his dead brother floating beside them in the air as he is carried away from his home.

_Tubbo did this. Tubbo deserves to pay for what he did to me._

Tommy shook his head.

_Dream did this._

Tommy hesitantly shook his head.

“I did this,” he settled on.

Tubbo is his friend, he can’t hurt him. Dream is his friend, he can’t hurt him.

_Am I my friend?_

He begins to stare a bit too long at lava.

_Jump in._

He begins to collect gunpowder, keeping next to the chest he keeps his sand in.

_Mix them._

It’s a good thing Dream takes his sword away, for multiple reasons. For one, he doesn’t deserve it. For two…

_You know what to do._

He shakes his head. The thought gets louder. He shakes his head more. The thoughts just gets louder.

_Kill someone. Whoever I see next, I’ll slit their throat._

He begins to avoid the ocean. To avoid the river. To avoid the lake. To avoid glass. To avoid the bathroom mirror.

It’s tempting. The thoughts are loud. But he can be louder.

In Logstedshire, he’s alone 95% of the time (except when his best friend Dream comes and visits him), and he’s thousands of miles away from anyone. He builds a screaming station, but he doesn’t use it. He just sits outside his tent and screams. At the top of the log walls Ghostbur built and screams. Under the Christmas tree and screams. By the beach and screams.

He mainly screams at himself. He screams to stop, to shut up, to make the thoughts _leave him alone._

Sometimes, he screams for others. For his best friend(s), for his father, for anyone, everyone. Sometimes, he surprises himself with who he’s willing to scream for. Tubbo, Dream, Phil, Ranboo, they make sense. But sometimes he screams for Eret, Bad, Quackity, Punz, Sapnap. The one that surprised him the most is when he screams for his brothers.

No one showed up when he screamed.

Except for Dream.

He doesn’t tell Dream about the thoughts, because when Dream is there, the thoughts… stop.

He gets scared when Dream isn’t there.

He gets scared when Dream finds his basement, and starts lighting TNT, starts… not yelling at him. He doesn’t yell, not like Wilbur did. He chides him. Like a disappointed parent.

When Dream leaves, as usual, the thoughts come back.

He doesn’t even argue with them. It’s been so long that he’s been like this. Arguing with the thoughts doesn't work, ignoring them doesn’t work, doing what they say doesn’t work. Nothing works.

Tommy walked down the beach, and looked at the water, catching his own reflection in the waves.

He begins to build a tower.

He jumped into water at the last second.

_What?_

He still doesn't know why he did that.

The thoughts get worse as he burrows under Techno’s home. Probably a lack of proper fresh air, he tell himself, and he climbs out to the snow.

Techno finds him.

_He’s going to kill me. I’m going to die. C'est la vie mother fucker, it was nice being here, but I’m going to be killed by my own remaining brother._

Techno is… frazzled. Covered in blood. At his side is a bloody picaxe.

_He’s going to kill me with a picaxe. Fitting. I don’t deserve a sword._

Techno doesn’t kill him.

He’s confused, upset, tired. Tired of Tommy’s bullshit, mainly, and tired because he just fought everyone in a 4 v 1 and didn’t die. Tired because he had an anvil dropped on him and didn’t die. Tired because all he had was a picaxe and Quackity had an axe and yet he didn’t die. He wasn’t going to let his bastard of a younger brother best him now.

It reminds Tommy of old times, back when the four of them were all living together in a house similar to this one. Very similar to this one.

_Old times._

_Act like it._

So Tommy acts the part.

Ranboo and Ghostbur show up. They were lost in the snow for a while, and both complained about getting wet, so Tommy acts the part he knows he used to play and makes fun of them.

Ghostbur leaves, and he’s left with Ranboo and Techno, so he continues. He asks them questions that make them visibly uncomfortable, because that’s what Tommy always did, right? He just needs to convince them that he’s fine, that he’s still the Tommy from years ago, from months ago, that cusses out his enemies and upsets his friends and is generally terrible to be around.

_No one liked me._

Techno seems suspicious. 

“Never show your face around here again,” Tommy tells Ranboo.

Ranboo makes a face he can’t understand, and as he walks away he starts writing in that book he always writes in. Tommy wishes he knew what he was writing, but Techno is talking again and he listens because what if he says something that Tommy can use to make fun of him and he needs to keep up the act.

Techno is suspicious.

Sometimes, Tommy forgets to keep up the act. He talks about missing Dream, then talks about not remembering how he actually feels about his best friend. He shakes when they enter the Final Control Room, and starts dissembling his bow, and talking about how much he wants to Dream there, because Dream would help, and he’s wrapping the string around his arm and Techno has to stop him before he cuts off blood flow to his hand. His breath starts to speed up when Techno tells him to give him his armour, and starts to warily eye his bow and takes a step back.

He forgets to keep up the act, and Techno starts to act differently.

Techno is starting to not act like the older brother he remembers from his childhood that would never go easy on him when they sparred, who would team up with Wilbur to play a prank, who listened to Phil’s instructions and only Phil’s.

He starts acting… nicer.

He tells Tommy where he’s going whenever he leaves, he always conveniently leaves a stack of gapples by the entrance to dnret, he gives Tommy an ender chest and tells him to put whatever he wants in it, he never tells Tommy to take off his armour, even when he himself does.

Tommy is… confused.

The act starts to crumble.

The thoughts get quieter.

“Are you okay?”

It snaps him back to reality.

He looks up from where he was sorting through his chests at his older brother, who’s standing in front of his triple lock doors, arms crossed, face as deadpan as it always is.

“What?” Tommy says, and he laughs a bit in the middle of it, sounding incredulous. Tommy used to do that all the time.

“You’re acting weird and…” Techno hesitates. He wants to say something, but he doesn’t.

Tommy looks at his hands.

“You’re quieter than usual,” he settles on.

_The act failed. I failed._

He doesn't know what to do, what to say in response. _What would Tommy do?,_ Tommy thinks to himself. _Annoy him._

He grabs a grapple and starts eating it.

Techno raises a single eyebrow. “Seriously?”

_He’s annoyed. He’s going to leave me. He’s going to kick me out. He’s going to kill me. I annoyed him. Kill me. Leave me. Do it. Please. Do it. Please. Please._

It’s loud inside, but incredibly quiet outside.

When Tommy looks away from his chests and at his brother, he’s moved. Techno is kneeling in front of him, a few feet away. Close enough to touch, far away enough that he could run if he wanted. It’s strategic. Techno knows what he’s doing. 

“What do you want, bitch?” Tommy says, and he tries to sound confident, but he can tell it doesn’t work from the way Techno’s face softens. Techno’s face softens. _Techno’s_ face softens.

“You’re shaking.”

_Leave me. Please. Please._

_Shut up,_ he tells himself.

_Please, please, please._

Techno is speaking. Tommy’s mind is too full to catch it.

_PLEASE._

Something smooth, and ever so slightly furry, touches his free hand, the one not holding a half eaten gapple. 

Tommy, with all the grace as he’s always had, collapses into his brother, closing the distance between them and clinging to his shoulder, shaking. He doesn’t cry. He refuses to. He comes close, but he doesn’t.

Techno is… surprised. Taken aback, perhaps. He freezes, and Tommy feels it. He starts to let go, but Techno finally reciprocates, hugging Tommy back, tightly, warmly, as if he's scared of what will happen if he lets go.

_Please…_

_Please don’t let go…_

**Author's Note:**

> come follow me on tumblr @/the-pigeon where im a lot more active and all i post about is mcyt :3


End file.
